Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The extra €105 million for Bord na Móna is welcome, by the way.

Broadband connection points were dealt with earlier. There were to be 300 such connection points. As I understand from reports, the first group of 50 has been connected. That is all that has been connected. There are 51 connection points at the moment. The Department, in reply to a media query, stated the shortfall was due to a disengagement locally when sites that were to be provided were backed out. However, the Department's reply indicates that only 47 were withdrawn. There seems to be a discrepancy in terms of what happened and why that number has reduced dramatically.

My other question is about penalties. I engaged with Ministers and officials, including some of those present, on this matter for three and a half years. We were assured that strict penalties and timelines would apply to the delivery of the contract. Deputy Richard Bruton, when he was Minister, stated NBI was bound by contract and by the regulator. He stated:

The contract we have put in place has checks and balances built in because National Broadband Ireland is privately owned. That is why we have very strong governance arrangements in place, with key performance indicators, stringent penalties and a clawback of 40% of the value of the asset if it has value at the end of the process.

The Department's website states there will be significant penalties "to address underperformance" to protect the State's investment. There seems to be a discrepancy with regard to performance, in that we have learned that no penalty clause has been invoked to date. Why is that?